Course management: choosing targets and clubs.

Strokes gained: measuring every shot

Mark Broadie, a professor at Columbia Business School, set out the strokes-gained method in his 2014 book "Every Shot Counts". Each shot is scored against a consistent standard. According to the publisher's material, as summarised, the work drew on PGA Tour ShotLink data from 2003 and amateur data gathered since 2005 through his Golfmetrics program.

Several of Broadie's findings reach us only through book reviews, which we have not checked against the book. We report them as the reviewers describe them, and treat them as unconfirmed:

• A LibraryThing reviewer reports that, in Broadie's analysis of the top 40 professionals from 2004 to 2012, approach shots accounted for about 40 percent of their strokes gained against the field, and drives plus approaches about 68 percent, with similar ratios for amateurs.
• The DIY Golfer's review describes a simulation in which a team whose professional plays every shot over 100 yards always beats a team whose professional plays the short shots. The reviewer reads this as showing the long game is the biggest difference between amateurs and professionals.
• The same review reports that, for most golfers, laying up to a full-wedge distance is worse than going for the green and leaving a shorter partial wedge, because distance to the hole is the main factor in expected score.

The review also gives Broadie's tour one-putt figures for 2003 to 2012: 99 percent from 2 feet, 96 from 3, 77 from 5 and 50 from 8. These are lower than the PGA Tour figures GOLF.com published in 2019 (for example 99.4 percent from 3 feet); the two use different seasons and methods. Both sets are on the putting page.

DECADE: aggressive off the tee, conservative into greens

DECADE is a course management system created by Scott Fawcett, a former touring professional. As GOLF.com's Alan Shipnuck described it in 2020, it was built from ShotLink data and Google Earth images of hundreds of courses to estimate where shots finish for a given club and yardage. GOLF.com said more than 200 college programmes had used the app, and that Fawcett advised Bryson DeChambeau in college and early in his professional career and has worked with Will Zalatoris since junior golf. (GOLF.com notes the article was produced in partnership with CDW.)

Fawcett's guidance:

• Be aggressive off the tee and conservative into greens.
• Aim approaches at the middle of the green or the "fat side", the side with more room, rather than at tucked pins. His target is for about 70 percent of approaches to finish on the fat side.
• His summary is that you gain shots by not losing shots on purpose.

Fawcett's own estimates of how wide a drive's landing window needs to be, and of how much each extra driver gains, have not been independently checked, so they are not repeated here.

Practical tactics from Kellie Stenzel

Kellie Stenzel, a GOLF Top 100 Teacher, gave GOLF.com a set of practical tactics in 2023:

• Use the whole tee. Move across the teeing area to open a better angle away from hazards or trees, and to play into the wind to reduce its effect.
• Aim for the easy part of the green. Such as the centre, rather than carrying trouble to reach a tucked pin. Favour the side of the green away from the pin, so a miss does not leave a short-sided pitch.
• Lay up to a favourite distance when the green is not comfortably within reach.
• Play what is working today. If your chipping is off, putt from farther off the green.
• Avoid high-lipped fairway bunkers.
• Have a Plan B swing. A shorter, controlled or knockdown swing for days when the full swing is not cooperating.

Where the advice disagrees

Laying up

Stenzel recommends laying up to a favourite approach distance. Broadie's finding, as reported in The DIY Golfer's review, is that leaving a shorter partial wedge usually beats laying back to a full wedge.

Driver on tight holes

The DIY Golfer's review says strokes-gained data favours driver over 3-wood even on narrow holes, though the reviewer would still take 3-wood on a day it is working better. Stenzel advises starting with whichever fairway wood you hit most consistently.

Course management and the Rules

A few parts of the 2023 Rules of Golf, in effect from 1 January 2023, shape how you plan a round:

• Distance information. Since the 2019 changes, Rule 4.3a allows distance-measuring devices unless the Committee adopts a Local Rule prohibiting them (Model Local Rule G-5). Check the competition's Local Rules.
• Advice. Rule 10.3 lets a caddie carry your clubs and give you advice and help, within limits, and you are responsible for your caddie's actions.
• Pace. Rule 5.6b asks players to play at a prompt pace and, in stroke play, allows "ready golf" when it is safe. The 2019 changes recommended making each stroke in no more than 40 seconds, and usually less.

The R&A says the next edition is due on 1 January 2028. More is on the pace of play page and the distance-measuring devices page.